Public relationships

I'm sure the term has been used before, but our firm recently used it as the theme for the IPREX Global Leadership Conference, which we hosted in Kansas City this year.  The simple change -- from Public Relations (i.e., do it to me) to Public Relationships (i.e., do it with me) -- stuck with me.

So I promptly registered the URL.

Then I read this graph from a recent Doc Searl's article in Linux Journal:

After Cluetrain came out as a book in January 2000, a higher principle than "markets are conversations" was suggested separately by open-source advocate Eric S. Raymond and Nigerian theologian Sayo Ajiboye. That principle is "Markets are relationships".

There's that word again.

We've been working at our firm to develop a new measurement system to better correlate what we do with the business outcomes of our clients.  A primary research tool developed by Dr. James Grunig at the University of Maryland was devised to measure -- you guessed it -- stakeholder relationships.  We haven't used it, so I can't attest to it's effectiveness.  If anyone has, please tell me.

The challenge in my everyday world is linking the future (Cluetrain) with the realities of the present ("Just write us a press release").  The evolution from "relations" to "relationships," combined with a way to measure a relationship's impact on a client's business, is looking like that link.